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Re: Do we really offer the future?


From: Kieren MacMillan
Subject: Re: Do we really offer the future?
Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2015 10:05:29 -0400

Hi Urs,

First off, thank you so much for your continuing efforts on behalf of Lilypond. 
They are really important, and no doubt time- and energy-consuming for you, 
with little promise of immediate benefit to you personally. The ‘Pond 
appreciates you!

> "why should a publishing house use LilyPond?”

We might start by asking the question “Why should *any* person use Lilypond?”, 
and then scale up from there.

> many people have become more aware of the basic questions about longevity of 
> binary and textual data formats and data processing

As you go on to say, Lilypond does that well right now, but certainly is not 
the only (or likely very best) such format.

> 1) Publishers receive heterogenuous data material from various sources 
> (editors, composers, engravers), and these are mostly done using Finale or 
> Sibelius (and in some cases Score). It is completely out of question to 
> requre all these people to switch to LilyPond.

Of course. But a transparent [two-way] translation interface would solve that 
problem immediately.

> Can we really offer "the" solution for this?

Not right now, that’s for sure.

> I don't think we can already guarantee [the ability to read/write MusicXML 
> files]

We definitely can’t. And until we can, we will have no chance of convincing 
anyone out there to seriously consider Lilypond.

> If one already uses MusicXML as the permanent and future-oriented storage 
> format, where is then the need to consider LilyPond for this?

To paraphrase a former U.S. President, “It’s the output, stupid!”  =)

> The first asset is the fact that plain text tools allow highly sophisticated 
> workflows and adaptation of the programs' functionality.

Yes.

> most publishing houses don't really care anymore about the editorial process, 
> and they have the impression that this could actually create more overhead 
> than they have currently

We might want to tailor a few “pitches” — complete with working demonstrations 
— to present to organizations with different needs. For example, a 
quick-and-dirty translation which (e.g.) took a Finale source filie and turned 
it [first via MusicXML, probably] into a Henle-lookalike Lilypond file in under 
5 minutes would be VERY compelling to certain people, and they wouldn’t want to 
see (or even care about) edition management, ScholarLY, etc. Then a second 
(likely longer) demo would be available for those working on critical editions. 
And so on.

> The second asset I see is that we can (principally, in the real-world it 
> isn't completely mature yet) completely separate content from representation, 
> which should be stressed very much when it comes to the questions of 
> long-term data storage and of repurposing content.

This, for me, is Lilypond’s killer app right now. When I output the scores for 
my musicals, there are at least four major targets: Full Score, Piano/Conductor 
Score, Vocal Score, and the various instrumental parts. In addition to having 
one source output to four different presentations is already great — but the 
ability to apply tweaks to any one (or more) of them from an external edition 
file is incredibly powerful.

> IF we could come up with a promising path to let LilyPond work with MEI data 
> (that is firstly: use MEI as input to LilyPond and/or convert MEI data to 
> LilyPond files, and secondly: Be able to convert to both directions so one 
> can also edit scores as LilyPond and convert them back to MEI for storage) 
> that _could_ be the satisfactory answer I claimed as missing above.

Agreed! This is a wonderful idea that should be pursued vigorously, unless we 
uncover a very compelling reason not to do so.

> To conclude:
> - most people in the business have moved away from taken the status quo
>  with Finale and Sibelius for granted

That is a very important point!

> IF we should be able to come up with convincing solutions or at least 
> roadmaps I see that we now have better chances than ever to get LilyPond a 
> foot in the door with the publishing business in general.

+1

> Sorry for that elaborate text, but I think it is important and hopefully 
> fruitful.

Absolutely! Thanks again.

Best,
Kieren.
_______________________

Kieren MacMillan, composer
www:  <http://www.kierenmacmillan.info>
email:  address@hidden




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